Posts Tagged With: Blog

Dear Poop Deck Community,
This is my last post (I think) from this address. The Captain has a new home and he would love all of you to visit if you haven’t already.
The new site (easy to remember)
talesfromthepoopdeck.com
Go visit and bring a friend:)
For now…Captain out.
And if you haven’t “Liked” me on Facebook yet, we can still friends…as long as you follow the link and hit that button.

Like this:

Captain’s Log. Daddy Chronicles. Diaper Date 2115. As a teacher I know that there are many times that I have to intercede and settle petty disputes. While I do not consider myself as wise as King Solomon, I hope that I am fair in my judgments As a father, I have also had to make certain rulings. Sometimes these rulings involve siblings, neighbors, friends, etc. Be it as a father or a teacher, it is hard because you can’t make everyone happy.

However, sometimes it gets personal. And last week it got personal.

In my classroom we deal with the difference between connotation and denotation., I like to compare connotations to baggage that words have – sometimes that baggage is a good thing and sometimes it can be negative., Rarely is it indifferent.

My daughter has friends of both genders. Friends that are boys and friends that are girls. Obviously there is a stigma to saying that you have a “boyfriend” or a “girlfriend”.

I just didn’t think it started when you were 5.

Apparently, one of her (boy) friends, friends that is a boy, was being teased by other boys because he plays with her. And because of that he told her that he didn’t want to play with her anymore because they called her his girlfriend.

Now Poop Deck Community bare with me here. I was thrilled to learn that I was a father. And I was equally thrilled to learn that I was the father of a daughter. But since the day The Eldest was born, there is one thing I have been preparing myself for – boys.

Yes, I know girls can be mean. And who knows, maybe boys will never be a problem? But that doesn’t keep me from preparing myself.

Every time I workout watch infomercials of people working out, I imagine chiseling myself into the dad that no boy would mess with. I imagine standing at the door breaking boards with my pinkie in a tank top, with a prison number tattooed on my neck (fake of course, but looking like a real tattoo) while I sip a latte (other pinkie up). But I digress.

Back to the situation. I had to take a minute to take the whole situation in. I knew The Eldest would have been saddened by the loss of a friend. I also knew that the boy didn’t mean any harm. He wasn’t saying anything was wrong with my daughter. He was just trying to break up with her as a friend.

Because of what his “friends” were saying.

The father bear in me wanted to tattoo the prison numbers on my neck and talk to these boys. However, sanity took over.

“Why can’t you play with her? Because your friends are making fun of you?”

“Uh huh.”

“Well, let me make this simple. If they are making fun of you for having a friend then they aren’t good friends. Secondly, and this is important –

My daughter is NOT your girlfriend.”

“Uh huh.”

“Now go play.”

Five minutes later the two of them were laughing a playing. And they probably wouldn’t remember the conversation if asked about it now. But it now lingers in my head. My first run in as an overprotective father.